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Recent PoliticsPosts

A Timely, Smooth Launch for the Health Care Law? The Jury’s Out

Posted on 06/19/2013 by | Washington Watch | Comments

Bulletin Today | Personal Health | PoliticsWill everything be ready to launch President Obama’s health care law by the Oct. 1 deadline? We’re getting mixed signals. Start with a report released June 19 by the Government Accountability Office, the first in-depth look at the sprawling system. The upside: “Much progress has been made in establishing the regulatory framework and guidance required for this undertaking, and [the administration] is currently taking steps to implement key activities of the [online insurance marketplaces],” the report said. (Read the full …

Are We Teaching Our Next Generation the Right Stuff?

Posted on 06/19/2013 by | News, Culture, Sights and Sounds | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsI was on break from college, and proud to tell dad about my new major. “General Studies in the Humanities” sounded cool to me, but he was less impressed. “What the hell use will that be in world?” he wanted to know. “I’ll be a better human,” I snarked, stumped for a better answer. A report released today would have helped my case with dad. The Heart of the Matter comes from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ Commission …

Strengthen Social Security and Medicare — Don’t “Reform” Them

Posted on 06/19/2013 by | AARP Media Relations Team | Comments

Politics | Your LifeThis initially ran in The Huffington Post. In the Washington Post this week, Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt writes about the need to “reform entitlements.”  Last week, AARP volunteers from every state in America came to Capitol Hill to ask their Democratic, Republican and Independent members of Congress to strengthen Social Security and Medicare by coming up with responsible solutions. Those who create the messages around recent attempts to cut Social Security benefits have also called for “entitlement reform.”  With …

Automatic Prescription Refills: Helpful or Wasteful?

Posted on 06/18/2013 by | Washington Watch | Comments

Bulletin Today | Personal Health | PoliticsPrescription drug programs that automatically ship out refills at regular intervals can help older Americans follow doctor’s orders, according to business organizations that are lobbying against a Medicare crackdown on the practice. Medicare, though, says that the automatic refill programs lead to waste when beneficiaries get prescriptions they don’t need and can’t return them. In February, the Centers for Medicare & Medicare Services (CMS) proposed new regulations that say, in part: “Shipment of unwanted medications is not only wasteful, but …

Supreme Court: Drugmakers’ Pay-for-Delay Deals Can Be Illegal

Posted on 06/17/2013 by | News | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsDeals between brand-name drugmakers and their generic drug competitors that keep cheaper products off the market might illegally prevent competition, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled June 17. In so-called pay-for-delay deals or reverse settlements, a patent holder pays a would-be competitor not to sell a generic version of a drug for a specified period of time. The brand-name manufacturer can continue to charge monopoly prices, and the generic company is compensated for inaction. In Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, the …

Does a Top Drugmaker’s Playbook Stifle Competition?

Posted on 06/17/2013 by | News | Comments

Personal Health | Politics | Public Policy InstituteIf you owned the bestselling prescription drug of all time and its patent was about to expire, how would you prepare for competition from generic drugs? You might look at what Pfizer did when time was running out on its patent for the cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor, which by 2011 had become the all-time bestselling prescription drug of any kind. And you could save yourself some time by reviewing a new AARP Public Policy Institute case study of Pfizer’s approach. The …

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